


A Connection

by Haberdasher



Series: Twitch Plays Pokemon [8]
Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series), Twitch Plays Pokemon - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Twitch Plays Emerald, Twitch Plays Pokemon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-12
Updated: 2014-04-12
Packaged: 2018-03-02 21:16:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2826365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Haberdasher/pseuds/Haberdasher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A gains an unexpected friend in her post-Champion life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Connection

A’s PokeNav had been ringing nonstop since she became Champion of Hoenn. She got calls from reporters, Gym Leaders from Hoenn and other regions, random Trainers she’d fought along her journey… it never ended. She had never been much of a people person, and after a while, all the constant blathering made her want to chuck the PokeNav out the window.

This call was different from the very beginning, though. Pretty much all the callers led with some sort of vapid pleasantries- “Hi, I’m X, congratulations, I hope you have time to talk, I just have a few quick things I’d like to say…”- and such empty flattery and pithy introductions only made her want to crush her PokeNav even more. This caller, refreshingly, didn’t bother with the small talk.

"I heard you talking about the voices."

"Ye-es?" After the first few interviewers gave her weird looks and awkwardly changed the subject after every mention of the voices, she’d stopped trying to explain what had really happened during her journey. Nobody’d ever asked about them before. Nobody wanted to acknowledge that their latest Champion, in addition to being a teenage girl, was apparently delusional to boot.

"I believe you."

"You… wait, what? Why? How? Who even are you?"

"Red. I’ve heard them, too."

A clutched her PokeNav more tightly. “Red… Oh, I know I’ve heard that name before, give me a minute…”

"Doesn’t matter. It hasn’t been long since they left, has it? Only since you became Champion, I bet. You’re probably having a rough time."

A started pacing the room absentmindedly. “Yeah, I mean, it’s been really hectic, there’s just so much to do, and everybody wants me to talk… and then they won’t even listen when I do.”

"I’ll listen. No matter what, I’ll listen. I believe you. I’m here for you, I promise."

A stopped walking around, took a deep breath, and slowly exhaled. “Okay. Yeah, that’d be good, that’d be great actually. But why?”

A cold laugh echoed through the speakers of the PokeNav. “I know what this is like. And I would’ve done anything to talk with somebody who understands.”

A started to stammer out a response, but the device beeped and the screen went back to the default menu. He’d hung up. But she had his number now. She had that much at least, a connection to somebody else who’d been through the same thing.

It wasn’t until she thought to look up his name on the PC a few hours later that A found out Red was the former Champion of the Kanto region. A fellow Champion (okay, former Champion, but same difference, right?) as well as a fellow… well, whatever you’d call that.

A found herself calling Red the very next day.

"A."

"Is this a good time? I just… I wanted to talk, and to ask you about stuff, but I can call back…"

"You’re fine. What’s going on?"

"Well, nothing special, I was just kind of curious about what you’d gone through… I found out that you used to be Kanto’s Champion, was that… you know, because of them?"

"Yeah. Woke up one day and they were there. Got a Pokemon, crossed all of Kanto, became Champion, they left."

"So you weren’t a Trainer before either, huh? That’s what happened with me, too. I’d always wanted to be a Trainer, but it was so weird having it happen like that."

"Me too." A started to speak, but he interrupted. "It was tougher than I’d imagined, so much tougher."

"Yeah, definitely. Sometimes I just wanted to stop and down a few burgers and take a nap, you know?"

"I know."

"But then so much happened, and it really wasn’t that long, if you think about it…"

"I suppose so."

"Well, I-" A’s mother pounded on the door, and while she couldn’t quite hear the words through the wall, she seemed to be saying something about having to get ready. "Sorry, I have to go. We’ll talk more later, okay?"

"Okay."

A sighed as she turned towards the door and tossed her PokeNav onto her bed.

She started calling him more and more frequently, and not always to ask about the voices.

"So. What’s Kanto like, anyway? I’ve never been outside Hoenn, though I’ve always wanted to go traveling."

"It’s…" She could hear his breathing on the other end of the line. "I don’t know. Busy. Hoenn?"

"Well, I… uh… it’s kind of hard to describe, it’s kind of a weird question, isn’t it? There’s a lot of water- I spent so much time surfing, and I went underwater, and it’s gorgeous down there! It doesn’t look like Kanto has much water at all, and that’s a shame. The sea’s beautiful, just looking out at the waves, and when the sun’s setting and you get all the colors…"

"Hmm."

"You don’t talk much, do you? You okay with me talking so much? Am I talking your ear off?"

"You talk. I listen. I promised."

"Alright, alright. Anyway…"

Although sometimes they did get into more serious discussion of their shared past.

"Your Torchic. What happened to it?"

"Um… well, I released it. Or, I guess, they released it for me. They released a few others, too, along the way. But that was all pretty early on. My Azumarill and I stayed together pretty much the whole time, and we’re still really close. Should I get her to say hi?"

"No, no… I lost some, you know. I released my starter too."

"Oh, I’m sorry! I mean, I guess it happens, maybe it’s not that big a deal, but, you know, it still stinks…"

"I lost twelve in one day."

"You… oh, that really sucks, I’m so sorry, that… wait a minute, that reminds me of something- that wouldn’t happen to have been on a Sunday, would it?"

"…Bloody Sunday, they called it."

"Oh, I heard about that! They kept mentioning it this one Sunday, it was really weird. I never knew what they were talking about. Guess now I know, huh? And knowledge is power, they always say."

Sometimes they just talked about their lives in general.

"Being Champion is such a drag- all this battling, and the interviews, and having to give speeches… ugh. Is that why you gave it up? Because I’m thinking about just resigning too, all this work is just wearing me out. I didn’t sign up for this, you know?"

"No. I… thought they’d come back. So I ran off, trained in Mount Silver, and waited. And they found me. New person, same voices. I fought them off."

"Wait, so it’s not just us two that have gone through this, then? I thought it was just the two of us."

"There’s another. AJ- he’s the one that fought me. But he’s Johto Champion, and when he’s not doing work for that he’s off with… never mind. He’s always busy, that’s all."

"Well, that’s fine. He can go off and be busy doing whatever, it doesn’t bother me. I’m just glad I have you."

The first time A got a break from her Championship duties, she went off on the vacation she’d always dreamed of, going to distant regions, relaxing in far-flung towns the world over. Except that now, her final travel spot was a dinky little town that she’d never even considered visiting before.

One called Pallet Town.

As A surfed onto the town’s beaches, she couldn’t help thinking that Kanto and Hoenn weren’t as different as she’d imagined. Pallet Town was right by the sea, and her own home in Littleroot wasn’t. Pallet wasn’t a busy town at all, not like Red had said. There were only a couple houses in the whole place, and a line of trees isolated it from the bustling cities not far off. Really quite like Littleroot, when she thought about it. A little slice of home, right here in Kanto.

After a brief walk during which A tried and mostly failed to wipe the sand off her clothes and dry off, she stopped in front of a house, triple-checked her map to make sure that she was in the right place, and knocked four times on the door. The knocks seemed loud, but maybe it was just because the rest of the town was so quiet.

The door flung open.

"A?"

He was shorter than she thought he’d be. Short and skinny and delicate, like one of his Pidgeot’s renowned Whirlwinds could blow him away in an instant. But it was him, it was definitely him.

"Red!" She ran in the door and, in trying to hug him, knocked him to the ground.

"Oh god, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I swear I’m not usually that much of a klutz, are you okay?"

He stood up, grinned, and hugged her.

"Never been better."

Their conversations never seemed to stop after that. After months of talking over a PokeNav, it was wonderful to have a face to put to the name, and not only that, but to watch his every smile and frown, to see him staring intently in her direction and to know that he was taking in every word.

A few days into A’s visit, the two were still talking, this time laying side-by-side on Red’s bed, which was covered in stuffed Pokemon.

"Run me through the names of all your stuffed Pokemon again? I think I forgot a couple. Was that one named Bootsie?"

Color rose to his cheeks. “So I like stuffed Pokemon. Is that so wrong?”

"Who said it was wrong? I don’t think it’s wrong at all! It’s pretty cute." She poked him in the side as she said the last word, and he leaned towards her, his arm against hers.

"Cute, huh?"

"That’s what I said. Cute."

"I…"

"Anyway." She poked him in the forehead this time, a bit harder than she intended, leaving a red mark at the impact site. His hand flew up to his forehead and covered the blotch. "Oops, sorry. Anyway. You still haven’t told me all that much about your journey with the voices. What’s up with that?"

"You talk, I listen-"

"That’s a stupid excuse, and you know it."

"I just don’t like talking about it, okay?"

"But why? I mean, okay, it’s kind of freaky having to put up with all that, and I was super-tired at the end of it, but when it comes right down to it, it was kind of fun in a way, you know?"

Red sat up in bed and edged slightly away from A. “You’re crazy.”

"So they say." She let out a soft giggle.

"No, you’re… crazy. You call that fun? How was that fun?"

"I mean, getting to travel all around Hoenn, making new friends, becoming the Champion- I’d always admired Champions, and I never would have guessed I’d become one! Okay, so it’s not all it’s cracked up to be, but… it was still kind of a neat experience."

"Those were the worst two weeks of my life."

"Not for me. In fact… even if I had the choice, I think I’d do it all over again."

He looked over at her, shook his head, then cradled his head in his hands. “Maybe it was different for you. Because you weren’t the first, or because you’re a girl…”

"Hey, what does that have to do with anything?"

"AJ said they wanted a girl, okay?"

"Well, that really shouldn’t have anything to do with it."

"The voices don’t do what they ‘should’. That’s the problem. They do stupid stuff and you’re just along for the ride."

"Well, yeah, but… my life’s gone in a whole different direction because of them, and I kind of like it. I wouldn’t want to be stuck twiddling my thumbs in Littleroot when I could be out exploring the world with my Pokemon."

"Well, I’d love to be stuck in Pallet Town for the rest of my life, to not have to put up with… this. I’d give anything to have not gone through that."

"Anything? Really?"

"Anything."

Red’s words still rang out in A’s mind as she sneaked out of the house in the middle of the night as Red slept.

She’d never told him that she had summoned the voices. It was the only secret she’d kept from him. But as she found a vacant patch of grass on the outskirts of town and started sketching patterns into the ground with a stick, she wondered if he ought to have known. Maybe he would’ve looked down on her for it, given how much he hated the voices. But maybe that was how it should have been.

But in the end, it didn’t really matter.

A stepped into the center of the circle she’d drawn, one filled with intricate patterns of swirls and dots, careful to avoid smudging the design even slightly with her movement. She dropped a large smooth stone at her feet, and the sketched lines glowed with an eerie pale blue light.

She closed her eyes and felt the breeze circle around her and send her hair soaring as her thoughts raced.

Focus. Focus. She had to focus. Even the slightest error caused by a brief lapse in concentration could be utterly devastating. So she had to keep standing there and envision it. Envision Pallet Town as it was before Red had become Champion- much the same place, if his descriptions were to be believed. Envision his journey, a loop around the vast continent of Kanto.

Envision herself going through all that he had done.

The wind ceased, and A tentatively opened her eyes.

She was inside, in a room she’d gotten to know well over the last few days. He wasn’t in there with her this time. Nobody was.

A sing-song voice called out from downstairs, “A, get out of bed! Professor Oak is looking for you!”

The woman’s voice from below was quickly drowned out by a cacophonic chorus of other voices, with a pattern that A quickly recognized.

It had worked.


End file.
